


Who Else But You

by jeni_andtheafterthought



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Consent, Diary/Journal, HP: EWE, M/M, Multiple formats, Non-Explicit Sex, POV Draco Malfoy, Pining, Romantic Soulmates, Soulmates, brief appearance of other characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-25
Updated: 2017-11-25
Packaged: 2019-02-06 19:53:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12824883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeni_andtheafterthought/pseuds/jeni_andtheafterthought
Summary: Draco loses his soulmate before he understands what that means.  Then, it happens again.  Quite the anomaly, Draco is encouraged to keep a journal following the experience.  Finding his soulmate, solving the mystery surrounding his soulmate bond may be more than he bargained for.





	1. The Journal

**Author's Note:**

> started as a response to a drabble prompt then it got away from me (surprise, surprise)  
> Original Prompt from [ anabellerosenai ](https://anabellerosenai.tumblr.com)  
> "Hello, could you write this for a Drarry drabble? Soulmate AU where you experience unfathomable, collapse, sob and heave, pain when your soulmate is about to die. Draco Malfoy has experienced this pain at least 3 times and keeps a journal for it. He has felt this pain the day after the dark lord was vanquished, (maybe near-death from abusive/neglectant relatives?), when Quirrel burnt to death, basilisk biting Harry, etc. Bonus if Draco loves his soulmate and worries every pain may be The Death."

_Entry 1- 1988_  
I don’t remember the first time so I can’t write it down. Mother and Father told me I was a baby and I got hurt and they didn’t know why. They took me to St. Mungo’s and a healer said I was fine.  My soulmate died. That is why I hurt so bad.  I thought I was going to die yesterday.  I am alive still. The healer said maybe my soulmate got recreated and bad luck made my soulmate die again so soon.  The healers want me to write it down.  Maybe if it ever happens again I can write that too.  They don’t think it will happen. I hope I can see them if they get recreated again.  
  


 

_Entry 2- 1992_  
Mother had the healer come see me at Hogwarts so I didn’t have to leave school.  She called it an “episode.” I had another “episode” she said.  It doesn’t sound as bad as it was.  I don’t remember it hurting so bad last time.  Last time I didn’t cry.  I think I cried because I was sad.  Not just because my chest hurt.  I couldn’t breathe for a minute.  I’m supposed to write down what it felt like.  It felt like when you smash your finger in a door but not just on your finger. On your whole body.  

Mother brought the journal with her.  No one has ever had a soulmate die three times in their lifetime.  Reincarnation is supposed to take time.  Something about the souls waiting on each other or something.  

Father said. He used these words. He said he was “quite discouraged by this young lady’s tendencies.” I thought it was strange.  I never thought about my soulmate being a girl.  But I guess she’s supposed to be a girl.  

There was some wizard that came by and wanted to study all of the weird soulmate stories he can find.  I guess he thought my story was weird.

When I was leaving the infirmary I saw Potter.  He looked bad.  I can’t imagine how unlucky his soulmate is.  I would feel sorry for her being stuck with him because he’s going to get himself killed.  Fighting trolls and super villains.  Yeah. Unlucky soulmate.  
  


 

_Entry 3- 1993_  
Malfoy’s do not create scandal.  That’s what Father said when he and Mother heard about it this time.  I did not tell them until I was back at the manor.  By now, I know that my stupid soulmate got herself killed again.  Or her parents can’t afford a decent house elf to take proper care of her.

Is it possible to have more than one soulmate?  What if one of my soulmates was killed by the monster from the Chamber of Secrets?  What if she was a muggleborn?  I think that is supposed to bother me.  It would bother Father.  I think it would also bother him that I don’t think I would have a girl soulmate. Mother promised me that he doesn’t know I am keeping a journal about my soulmate problem.  
  


 

_Entry 3- part 2_  
I had to spend a lot of time this summer with different specialists.  One of them told me that it is possible to have a boy soulmate.  He didn’t tell me if it was possible to fall in love with a boy soulmate.  I was too scared to ask.  I suppose soulmates can be best friends.  Maybe soulmates would be better friends than Potter and the Weasel.

The other specialist, a really old witch, said no one has ever had more than one soulmate.  

 

  
_Entry 4- 1994_  
I made it through a school year without another soulmate debacle.  I am relieved and upset.  I know my soulmate didn’t die this year, but now I don’t know if I even have a soulmate left.  Professor Lupin didn’t make me face the boggart.  I told him before class that I didn’t think I could find anything funny about watching my soulmate die and die and die again in front of me.  I also told him I didn’t want anyone asking why the boggart would think my soulmate was a boy.    
He told me that maybe my soulmate didn’t die.  I want to believe him.  He said that when your soulmate has a close call, you can feel it.  But it has to be very very close.  Prof Lupin seemed to know a lot about soul mates.  He also said that two boys could be soulmates.  He promised he wouldn’t tell anyone. He also said that when you meet your soulmate, you know it.  

He did not say how you know it.  Only that your soul pulls at theirs.  That you cannot ignore them.

~~Maybe it’s like being in a room with Potter.~~  
He is so I don’t know  
He always 

Some people won’t let you ignore them.  Walking around like they are just so wonderful.  I bet my soulmate has pretty eyes  ~~too.~~  
  


 

_Entry 5- 1995_  
It happened again.  If I have the timing correct, it was when Diggory died.  But that can’t be right.  I have never felt anything around him.  I really hope it was a coincidence.  I do not want to go my whole life without my soulmate.  I can think of him and my heart feels- good. 

It can’t be Diggory.  He never made me feel the way thinking of my soulmate makes me feel.  

~~I hoped it was Har-~~

It cannot be Potter.  He didn’t look like someone who just had a very, very close call with death. Did he?

 

  
_Entry 6- 1996_  
Another year gone by, nothing from my soulmate.  I thought he may have been in trouble once earlier this year.  Madam Pomfrey said it was a migraine.  

~~Harry didn’t have any close~~

I hope my soulmate is okay.  I hope he is happy.

 

  
_Entry 7- 1997_  
It is not Potter.  

He cursed me.  He almost killed me.  It was undoubtedly a situation that could be considered a “very, very close call.” I hit the floor with no delusions that I would live through it.  When he cursed me, he shouted something but I was, quite understandably, preoccupied.  I only remember staring up to the ceiling waiting to bleed to death.  No soulmate could have knowingly done that to me.  I still don’t understand why I was so heartbroken by it.  Everything I have been through this year, and it was that.  That is what broke my heart.  

I was lying there waiting to die and Potter was above me.  He looked like he was in as much pain as I was.  Not cut out for killing, I suppose.  Neither am I, evidently. If I could have just killed Dumbledore like I was tasked, none of this would have happened.  My godfather healed me, but the scars will still be visible.  Dittany is most effective applied before healing, not after.  

My soulmate could never hurt me like that.  Not on purpose.   ~~I wasted so much time falling for Potter when he couldn’t even be my~~

I should be grateful.  At least I know it isn’t him.  I can stop wasting my time wondering why my soulmate doesn’t want me.   

He is not my soulmate.

My soulmate was probably some unfortunate wizard who died in my fourth year. It is probably for the best.  I doubt I would live long enough to go find him anyway.   ~~With the Dark Lord living in my bloody house, it is only a matter of time before I say the wrong thing and he kil~~

No one is coming to save me.  

I will never have a normal life.

I will never fall in love, grow old…grow up.

What soulmate would want me after the things I’ve done.  The things I still have to do?

Yes, it’s better if we just find each other the next time around.

Maybe next time we can both deserve to be happy.

 

  
_Entry 8- 1998_  
I didn’t want it to be him.  I hoped and wished it would be anyone else.  Any wizard.  Any witch.  When they pulled him in by the back of his ragged shirt, threw him to his knees with his face distorted by some hex or curse, I knew.  I thought I was going to be sick.  I cannot begin to sort through what I felt.  I wanted to hold him.  I wanted to hit him.  He is my bloody soulmate and either he is too stupid to know or he chooses to reject it.  He left me.  He left me with ~~Volde~~ the Dark Lord and here we both were only hours ago.  If I identified him, they would kill him.  If I didn’t, I would be in more danger than usual.  

I knew it was stupid to put that much faith in him, but I lied.  I would recognize him anywhere.  I told no one.  Of course they figured it out.  But he escaped. That is going to have to be enough for me.  I know he will never come back for me.  

Will he care when he feels me die?

 

  
_Entry 8- part 2_  
He’s dead.  Voldemort said he would stop killing us if Harry came to him.  Part of me knew he would go, but he always makes it out okay.  He’s always okay somehow.  I was wise to keep myself from saying it aloud, but I believed he had a chance. I heard one of the Gryffindors say he went out to the Forbidden Forest when the Death Eaters pulled out of Hogwarts.  Why did they let him go alone? Why did they let him go?

He has always made it through somehow.

Not this time.  It has never hurt this badly before.  I screamed the second my lungs worked again.  I don’t know how long it lasted but no one noticed.  There are people screaming or crying or sobbing all over Hogwarts.  The only quiet ones are dead.   ~~Some of them are so little.~~

I have outlasted my usefulness to Voldemort.  Harry might not have to wait long for me.  I’m sure Voldemort will come into the castle soon.  I intend for fight for it. He has taken one home from me, he won’t take the other.

Maybe Harry won’t reject me in the next life.  We can be better people next time. We can 

 

Someone just said Hagrid is carrying Harry’s body back to the castle.  I don’t know if I can do this.


	2. Let Go

Draco wasn’t sure who said it, or even the exact words that were used.  They said Hagrid was carrying Harry.  There was only one reason he would be carried back to Hogwarts.  Draco was right; Harry was dead.  He felt a sob rip from his chest as he scribbled down one last line in his journal before shoving it in the pocket of his jacket.

Draco stepped into the courtyard.  His eyes moved past Voldemort but didn’t reach the crowd of Death Eaters advancing on the school.  Draco only had eyes for Harry.  Harry, in Hagrid’s arms, looked so small.  The usually chilling voice of Voldemort was nothing more than a roar in Draco’s ears.  The smell of blood and smoke faded around him.  The slight chill in the air was gone.  Draco was near losing himself completely when he heard his mother’s voice.

“Draco, come." 

His mother.  She was here.  Voldemort brought everyone.  Draco knew this meant the end.  Neither of his parents had wands.  Voldemort took Father’s wand, and Mother’s was in his pocket.  Every witch or wizard loyal to Voldemort was expected to fight here and now.  They were expected to leave victorious or not at all.  This was all he had left.  Draco could save her.  He would save his mother.  

His father’s plea to cross the courtyard meant so little to him.  His father.  It would be so easy to blame him for dragging him into a war and putting his mother in danger.  Blame would be easy, but Draco was too scared and powerless to change things. Not anymore.  Draco stepped forward knowing this show of defeat would lose him any friend he had left, any hope of freedom.  He kept his eyes on Harry.  Another step.  Another step.  He would save his mother, but he did not have enough courage on his own.  Harry would have.  

When Voldemort praised his surrender and pulled him into an icy, sickening hug of sorts, Draco kept his eyes on Harry.  Harry would have endured anything to save someone he loved.  If Harry could do it, Draco could try.  

Draco was only vaguely aware of his mother’s hand on his arm.  She pulled him aside, turning their backs on Hogwarts, on Voldemort, and on Harry.  She pressed his wand into his hand. Draco had not held this wand since Harry wrenched it from his hands at the manor.

"I have your wand.  He told me you were alive.  I had to come for you,” Narcissa said.

 _He told her? When would he have-? Is he still-?_  Draco turned at the same moment Harry threw himself from Hagrid’s arms.  He stood.  He stood in front of Voldemort.  A sharp realization hit Draco.  Harry did not have a wand. When no one else in the courtyard dared to move, Draco ran. This time, however, he was not running _away_.  

“Potter!” Draco shouted as he threw his wand into Harry’s outstretched hands.

He had to let Harry fight his own battle.  Draco had his own fight.  He found his mother in the fray and lead her away with his father stumbling behind them. Once they crossed borders of the wards, Draco apparated them to the manor.  

“I have to go back,” Draco told himself.

“Draco?” Narcissa said.  

Draco looked at his mother, her eyes wide in worry.  "I have to go back.“ With his mother’s wand still in his pocket, he knew they would not be able to follow.  They would be safe.

Draco returned to Hogwarts.  

* * *

The noise was dying around him.  He was exhausted and felt like he would shatter to pieces at the slightest touch.  It was over.  Voldemort’s body was sprawled on the ground.  Draco raised his eyes from the broken form.  Harry stood breathing heavily and shaking.  The two simply looked at each other.  Draco wanted to go to him but knew such a thing would be unacceptable.  A single wand wasn’t enough to make up for every horrible thing keeping them apart.  Draco’s heart longed to go to him.  His hands were desperate for contact.  Harry’s name on Draco’s lips would never be heard at this distance.  

Harry was quickly surrounded by people, breaking whatever moment they may have been having.  Of course this wouldn’t change anything.  No one was coming for Draco.

A heavy hand grasped Draco’s shoulder, "You’re coming with us.” The auror pulled Narcissa’s wand from his hand.  Well, _someone_ was coming for Draco.  Draco was being led away. 

He heard Harry’s voice behind him, “Wait!" 

Draco refused to turn, he wanted too badly to fall into Harry’s arms and-

"That’s not his wand. Give it to me.”

No, Harry wasn’t coming for him.  He just wanted the bloody wand. At least if Harry took it, the aurors would not snap it in two.  Draco wondered absently if Harry would feel it when the Dementors kissed his soul away.

* * *

The next couple weeks were a blur of trials, long and isolated hours in multiple holding rooms throughout the ministry, and when he was lucky, a couple hour of sleep.  Draco never once spoke up in his own defense.  He only had to endure one more day and the Wizengamot would do with him as they pleased.    
He was ushered into the room; he was surrounded by wizards and witches.  Many looked angry, some looked bored.  

“We have one last witness to speak against Prisoner DE0197,” the wizard, whose name he’d long forgotten, shouted  as a means to begin the proceedings.

“For,” someone said.

Draco couldn’t help himself.  He looked up at Harry Potter, dressed in muggle clothes and already making his way to the middle of the room.  Harry did not spare him a glance.

“Excuse me, Mr Potter?” the wizard said.

“I’m not speaking against him.  You may want to take notes, this will take a while,” Harry said.

Draco sat silently listening to Harry tell a room full of people who would be deciding his fate what a prick Draco had always been. 

“Fortunately, there are no laws keeping someone from being a right git. He isn’t some dark wizard to be thrown in a hole until the end of time.  He is, without a doubt, the reason I am standing here right now,” Harry continued.  He recounted how Draco gave him the wand during the battle, his refusal to identify Harry at the manor.  The minutes crawled by as Harry spoke. By the end of it, Harry was speaking of things Draco thought no one knew about.  The most significant of which was that night in the astronomy tower.  

When he finished speaking, Harry left the room.  Draco could have imagined it, but he seemed to hesitate a second as he walked past still not looking at Draco.  Draco felt his soul reach out for Harry’s.  

 _Souls are such stupid things.  Can’t even realize when they’re hurting themselves,_  Draco thought.

* * *

Hours later, Draco was free.  Free to do what, he wasn’t sure.  

“I, uh, I am supposed to escort you back home, to your home.  The manor,” Harry said.

It would be Harry’s job, wouldn’t it?  Draco only nodded and followed Harry through the Ministry, through the floo.  He stepped directly into his own room.  It seemed to be one of the few rooms in the manor that was not tainted by murderous dark wizards.  Draco put as much distance between himself and Harry as he could.  He locked himself in the bathroom.  

The shower spray felt better than flying.  Being clean was one of life’s underrated luxuries.  He threw away the clothes he took off never wanting to see them again.  Draco stepped back into his bedroom wrapped in a dressing robe.  He did not expect Harry to still be there.  

“I brought up some food,” Harry said awkwardly, “do you want me to grab some clothes for you?”

“I’m a criminal, not an invalid, Potter.  I think I can handle it,” Draco said.  He hated the regret he felt for lashing out.  

“Sorry,” Harry said. “I’ll give you a minute.”

“What the fuck is happening?” Draco whispered when Harry stepped out of the bedroom. He took a sandwich from the plate Harry left sitting on the bedside table.  He ate as he dressed himself in the blue cotton pajamas he rarely wore.  Draco wanted to sleep for days.  He didn’t even bother with the blankets.  The moment his head touched the pillow…

“Draco?”

 _Fuck._ “What?” Draco sat up.  He must have fallen asleep for a minute; he didn’t hear Harry come back in the room.

“I’m not really sure how to say this.  We-” Harry sighed.  Several seconds passed before he spoke again. “How long are we going to pretend we’re- that we’re not-”

“That we’re not what?  Enemies? Petty school rivals?” Draco snapped.

“Not where I was going with that. I was-” Harry said.

“Then what?  We’re not stuck with each other anymore?  There’s no way I’ll be allowed back to Hogwarts to finish school.  You can go about your life without me around now.” Draco felt like fighting would save him.  He has known for years that Harry rejected their soulmate bond.  Hearing Harry put that rejection into words would be enough to break him.

“Will you fucking stop?!” Harry said. “Don’t talk for a minute.  A full minute, set a timer if you must, but I have to say this to you.”

Draco tightened his hands into fists to hide their trembling.

“Good.  How long are we going to pretend that we are not soulmates?”

 _Please, no._ Draco silently begged.

“I know you have worked it out for yourself by now.  No one would fight a soulmate bond as hard as you have unless you really didn’t want it.” Harry stepped closer, though he was still half way across the room. “I know you don’t want me to be your soulmate, but it would be easier if we were at least in each other’s lives a bit. I can’t just ignore my soulmate. Maybe we can be friends?”

Tears burned Draco’s eyes and he begged himself not to let those tears fall.  He would not cry.

“No,” he whispered. 

“What?” Harry asked. “Why?” Harry’s voice cracked with emotion, though which emotion, Draco was not sure.

Draco looked away from Harry, still sitting on the bed with his clenched fists pressed to his lap. “I wish you all the happiness in the world.  I wish you love and peace, Merlin knows you deserve it. I wish you to be everything you want to be in life.  But I’m going to do all of this from a distance.” Draco looked back up at Harry. “I can’t be your friend.”

When Harry did not react, Draco continued.

“It would kill me. Friendship is not a compromise I can handle,” Draco said.  "Soulmate bonds only get stronger as will any feelings I have. It is not something that can be compartmentalized or overcome.  I’m sorry, Potter.  I can’t be your friend.“


	3. What Comes Next

“I’m sorry, Potter. I can’t be your friend,” Draco said. The words were heavy in the silence that followed.  

Harry broke the silence first, “Your mother is being released tomorrow. You should get some sleep.  You look like hell.” He turned to leave through the floo.  He stopped only to take a wand from his pocket and throw it back to Draco.  "Make sure she gets that.“

Draco was looking down at his mother’s wand in his hands when Harry left.

* * *

Draco scarcely left the manor.  The derisive looks from nearly everyone he encountered was bad enough.  The pitying looks he received from others was worse.  Seeing Harry Potter’s face everywhere he went was unbearable.  Harry’s birthday was practically turned into a national holiday to a point that last week’s Prophet was page after page of Golden Boy fanaticism.  The Quibbler was the only publication that managed to get a picture of him smiling, not that Draco noticed.  Draco would have to leave his room eventually.  He still needed to replace his wand.  There were only three weeks left until he returned to Hogwarts. He did not want to replace it. The next wand may be fantastic, but it wouldn’t be the same.

“There’s nothing for it,” he said to no one.  "It’s just a trip to Diagon Alley for a wand.“  Saying it for the third time today still didn’t make him feel any less sick to his stomach. Accepting that he was as ready as he could be, he headed to the floo.

"Fuck!" 

Harry Potter stepped through the floo, "Hello to you, too.”

“What?”

Harry looked Draco over, “You’re headed out?”

“What are you doing? Just showing up and asking about my day?” Draco stepped back instinctively.

“Is that bad?” Harry asked.

“Why would it be okay?” Draco asked.

“Your floo let me in.  I thought,” Harry paused, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans, “maybe you changed your mind about being friends.”

_Not this again.  It had broken my heart to send him away last time._

“I brought this,” he said, pulling Draco’s wand from his back pocket.  
Draco wanted to grab the wand from Harry’s hand.  Fear did not allow it.  So many things he wanted were within his reach, but he did not dare lift a hand for them.  He could imagine having the wand pulled from his fingertips before being lost to him forever, because why would the world start being kind now?

When Draco did not move to take the wand, Harry walked across the room to the desk. He placed the wand on the glossy surface of the marble desktop.  Draco expected Harry to leave; instead Harry leaned against the desk and crossed his arms across his chest.  Against the white of his t-shirt, Harry’s usually light brown skin looked much darker. This was likely emphasized by a considerable amount of time in the sun.  Draco could almost smell the warmth and sunshine on him.  Draco felt he would never be warm again.

Harry fumbled for conversation, “So, you’re going back to Hogwarts, yeah? They are cutting some pretty good deals for eighth year. Better rooms, better allowances for leaving school grounds.”

“I haven’t changed my mind,” Draco said.

“About?”

“About being friends.  I won’t do it." 

"Well, why not?” Harry asked.  

Draco would have told him he sounded like a petulant child, but he was having a difficult time keeping his thoughts straight.  Maybe nothing but the truth would make Harry stop pushing this.

“I can not do that to myself,” Draco started calmly.  "I can not imagine much that would be less appealing than standing around watching you go about your life.  Watching you go back to Hogwarts to everyone’s open arms.  Everyone will expect you to hate me, and what happens to me if you start agreeing with them?  Then you will move on from school, get the job you want, surrounded by the friends you want, simply because you asked.“ 

Draco’s calm was quickly shattering. "I refuse to tag along behind you knowing I could never be the friend to you that Granger or Weasley are.  I refuse to follow you feeling like an accessory simply because proximity to your soulmate _makes things easier_.  That’s what you said right?! Me being around would be easier?  Why the fuck would I want to stand around just to make it easier for you to live some fantasy life right in front of me? Why the fuck would I sit on the sidelines while watching you fall in love with someone else while you shove me to the side as part of some entourage made up of people you keep around just because we make things easier for you!?” By the end, Draco was shouting.  Tears threatened to fall, and this time he did not care if they did.  "I won’t tell you that you are not allowed to find happiness or love without me, but with the soulmates’ bond…you can not imagine what you’re asking of me.“

Harry said nothing.  He looked like a man experiencing an epiphany. Harry stood frozen, eyes wide, looking at Draco as though he had never seen him before.

"What? Something I said finally get through to you?” Draco asked.

“Yes,” Harry whispered.

When Harry started toward him, he closed his eyes and braced himself for a shove, a punch, whatever was coming.  Draco flinched when he felt Harry’s hands on him roughly pulling him forward.  

Days later, when Draco wrote about what he felt the moment Harry pulled him tightly into his arms, the journal’s pages would be filled with useless words: _like letting go of your broom to go into a free-fall; someone casting a warming charm when you didn’t even realize you were cold; the sensation of a dozen wands choosing you all at once; souls lining up as though they were two halves of a portrait coming back together after being torn apart, every jagged edge pressing perfectly into place with the full picture finally visible._ They were nice enough phrases for a journal, but they would fall flat. Nothing would ever capture the extent of what he felt.

Draco fought to steady his breathing as he held Harry with trembling hands.  Harry brushed his cheek against Draco’s shoulder in an affectionate gesture that should have been odd or uncomfortable. With Harry, it was neither of these things.  Every brush of skin brought a new and intense desire for physical contact, to be closer, to feel more, touch more.  

Harry spoke in a broken whisper, “I thought you hated me.”

Draco laughed weakly, “So did I.” He pulled away from Harry enough to see his face.  It did not go unnoticed when Harry’s grip on Draco’s robes tightened.  "But I was wrong.“

He looked down into Harry’s bright green eyes, "Is this real?”

“I hope so,” Harry answered.

Draco moved his hands from Harry’s back and reached for his glasses.  Harry leaned back avoiding his attempts to remove his glasses.

“I need them,” Harry said.

“How so?" 

"Need them to see, odd you haven’t worked that out.” Harry said, smiling,

“Things get blurry.”

“Close or far?”

“Far things get blurry.”

“I’ll just have to stay close then, won’t I?”

This time, when Draco moved to take his glasses, Harry didn’t resist.  Draco placed the glasses on the bedside table just within his reach.  Draco took Harry’s face in his hands, barely more than his fingertips on Harry’s cheeks.  He noticed the two little impressions on the bridge of Harry’s nose left from the frames.  He leaned in and kissed them with a soft press of lips.  

They stood still, both men wanting more but not knowing what to ask for, unsure how to ask for it.  If they stayed like that for a century with his hands on Harry’s face, Harry’s arms around his waist, hands grasping tightly at the fabric of Draco’s robes, his forehead against Harry’s, Draco would never consider even a single second wasted.  

Harry was the first to move.  His hands hesitating before moving to the row of buttons at the front of Draco’s robes. “Yes?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Harry worked each button and clasp open with a slow-moving care as though he was getting closer to a line he would not be permitted to cross.  Draco took his hands off Harry to let the layers of clothing fall to the floor.  He was naked from the waist up.  Harry’s hand hovered above Draco’s pale, scarred chest close enough he felt the warmth from his touch already.

“Yes?” Harry asked.

Draco nodded. It wasn’t until Harry’s fingers grazed his collarbone that Draco realized Harry was tracing his scars. 

“I did this,” Harry said, touching each pale line. “And you’re letting me touch you.”

The reality that Harry nearly killed Draco would always be there just as Draco’s involvement with the Death Eaters.  They could let every dark shadow of their past consume them, or they could fight their past by becoming more.  Draco would never admit it, not in words, not in writing, not in solid thought, but he believed that if Harry did not have such a thing in his past, Draco would never be able to face him for all the guilt he carried.  His scars were a reminder that they were equals, that Harry understood.

“We are so much more than this,” Draco said.  He pressed a hand over Harry’s.  Holding Harry’s hand to his chest he said, “We have done everything wrong from the very beginning.”

“If it’s good versus bad between us, it may take a while to break even,” Harry said.

“I will love you forever.  I will love you in the next life and the next. And this life? Everything I could hope for moving forward includes you.  I want you.  I want everything you will give me. I want us,” Draco let go of Harry’s hand and took a steadying breath. “If this isn’t what you want, I need you to be stronger than me.  I pushed you away once.  I don’t have it in me to do it again. If you want to go, go now.”

When Harry took his hands off Draco’s chest, Draco closed his eyes.  If Harry was going to leave, he could not watch him do it. 

The sensation of Harry’s hands on his neck, fingers pushing into his hair, was enough to send a shiver through his whole body. “You said you’d stay close,” Harry said.

“Only if you want me to,” Draco said.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Harry said. 

He was so very close. Draco could feel Harry’s words against his own lips as he asked, “This is okay?”

“Yes.”

Harry kissed him slowly, softly, still moving as though he was too close to the boundaries of what he was allowed. Draco took Harry into his arms, slid his hands beneath the fabric of his shirt. Every touch, every sigh, every point of contact was a silent plea for _more_.  They were not graceful when they fell onto the bed. They were not careful pulling off shoes then clothes. 

Draco could worship Harry’s body and had every intention to do just that.  Touches became more confident; kisses became more desperate; each sigh and moan sounded more wrecked than the last.  They were hot and hard, bodies pressed together where their physical need was greatest providing a beautiful friction. Each thrust of Draco’s hips pulled a moan from Harry. Harry brought a hand between them, taking them both into his strong hand and working them both until they were spent and breathless.  

Falling into each other’s embrace, they stayed tangled together. Neither seemed to mind being covered in sweat, the remnants of messy kisses, and more.  Draco was content with his head against Harry’s chest listening to the beat of his heart.  He was so mesmerized by the steady rhythm that Harry’s voice startled him.

“I’m sorry I kept your wand for so long,” he said.

Draco answered him with a nod of his head.

“It wasn’t right for me to keep it. I was-” Harry hesitated, “I was saving it.”

“Saving it? For?”

“For a day when missing you hurt too much.”

Draco held Harry tighter.  This was not going to be easy. It most certainly would not be perfect. Not even a soulmate bond would guarantee either of those things, but Draco was ready to choose Harry every day, to choose to be with him, to do his best to deserve Harry every single day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no beta - no proofreading - we die as warriors  
> These characters do not belong to me.
> 
> Thank you so very much to everyone who supported this story when it was still a WIP on tumblr. Without all of you, I doubt this would have ever been more than just the journal entries. Thanks anabellerosenai for the prompt that became a story. 
> 
> And lastly, thank you to my biggest supporter. Thank you for listening to me shout my scattered and half-formed ideas at you until something makes sense. Thank you for the enthusiasm, the support, and encouragement. Sorry I made you cry in public...and scream in a quiet cafe. Without you, half my stories would never happen.


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